Although maintenance dialysis prevents death from uremia, patient survival remains an important issue. Once renal replacement therapy is initiated, the range of the expected remaining lifespan in the United States Renal Data System (USRDS) report was approximately eight years (varies with race) for dialysis patients 40 to 44 years of age and approximately 4.5 years for those 60 to 64 years of age [1]. These values in older patients are only slightly better than those in patients with lung cancer and are much worse than the general population (which is 30 to 40 years for those aged 40 to 44 years and 17 to 22 years for individuals aged 60 to 64 years). Despite this, some evidence suggests that mortality rates among incident dialysis patients have decreased over the last few years, suggesting that improvements in therapy may provide beneficial results [1].

It is well established that inadequate dialysis is a contributor to lower overall survival. This has important implications since more intensive dialysis, particularly above a certain threshold value, may improve survival, possibly as with nocturnal hemodialysis.

Additional factors associated with the dialysis procedure may also correlate with decreased survival. As examples:

●Dialysis vintage is associated with an enhanced risk of death, with each additional year of dialysis treatment associated with an increase in the risk of death of approximately 6 percent [2].

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